Easter Riichi Mahjong at Southend-on-Sea’s Rendezvous Casino

Planned a group trip for the Easter weekend to go to the Rendezvous casino in Southend. The manager said we could bring our own Mahjong tiles. The casino is open 24 hours, despite it saying they close at 5am on their website. We arrived Friday lunchtime and departed Sunday afternoon, staying two nights at a bed and breakfast hotel. Geographically, it was annoying as the hotel and casino was 23 minutes’ walk apart.

The Mahjong tables were tucked away in the card room. The rest of the casino floor had your usual roulette, slots and blackjack, as well as a few other games.

We managed 15 hanchans over the two days. Nobody entered the card room while we were playing. Free soft drinks. Can’t complain. Not all went to oorasu. At least one person buttobi’d in nearly a quarter of the games played. One instance, that player was also yakitori. Yakitobi.

There were prizes for the person with the lowest overall score of the weekend, as well as the highest winning hand. This ended up being a tie between myself and another player. I had a ron of men hon haku ura 3, oya bai 1-honba. The other was rii pa mo, tan pin iipeikou, dora 2, ura 2, oya bai 1-honba.
Highlights included a pei chombo by one player, three last places in a row by another player and everyone having at least one yakitori.

Possibly planning a return trip over the May bank holiday. Which one as yet undecided. If you’re just looking for a place to crash and wash up, I would recommend the hotel we stayed. Bit far from the casino, but possibly the cheapest during the Easter period. We came back from the casino in the early hours and everything was fine. We didn’t disturb any other guests as we went straight to sleep.

Anyone who lives outside of London, let’s meet in the middle and plan something.